Or rather: time to merge with (move over to) one or more of the alternatives mentioned?
Would it really have to be specifically for British Friends (even if independent of) Britain YM or could it also be global in reach?
I can also suggest the ‘Christian Quakers’, ‘Quaker Prayer Group’ and ‘Quaker Theology’ Facebook groups as relatively lively alternatives (‘Christian Quakers’ is public, the other two closed).
With f&Friendly greetings,
Wim
From: quak...@googlegroups.com [mailto:quak...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rosalind Mitchell
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2013 2:28 PM
To: quak...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Quaker-B] Is the Quaker Business Method dead?
Further to my reply to Simon's post, while I stand by my view that Quaker-B in its current format has outlived its usefulness, I now see clearly that there is a very real need for a vigorous forum for British Friends, independent of BYM. I wonder what the best format could be, and whether Quaker-B has a role in establishing it? I gather from something said yesterday that even The Friend ("Independent Quaker journalisism since 1843"!) in its current über-bland incarnation won't publish anything the commissars at Fiends House don't want it to.
From: quak...@googlegroups.com [mailto:quak...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rosalind Mitchell
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2013 1:30 PM
To: quak...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Quaker-B] is quaker-b dead?
Quaker-B has served an important purpose for an impresively long time, given the volatility of cyberspace, but the world has moved on and I do feel it is time to lay it down.
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Dear Caddi,
Are you sure that Facebook is more open to abuse than a Google group??
Everything we write now is accessible to anyone through the link at the bottom of this notification e-mail…
Facebook groups come in sorts: public, findable-by-name-but-content-invisible and neither-findable-nor-visible-unless-you-get-the-url.
Of course Mark Zuckerberg & co can always access everything themselves, but information that has no commercial value is safe with them.
Most of the information that does have commercial value is anonymous, summarised figures anyway, not the content of our discussions.
Would forum software like we use at www.quakerfaithandfellowship.org be less open to abuse, in your opinion?
The decision making and blogging parts of that website are only accessible after login (so can’t be found by Google & co).
With f&Friendly greetings,
Wim
Dear Rosie,
The forum-website that you suggest as a possible way forward for the Quaker-B Google group is (with slightly different software) exactly how we started at www.quakerfaithandfellowship.org.
You will need a lot of community building to reach the point where QF&F is now, 5 years later.
The only additional value of creating a separate forum, is the "British accent".
Otherwise it is just another e-Quaker webspace of which there are quite a few already.
Too many actually, if you take into account that they compete for and fragment attention.
The alternative I can offer is, that I create a subforum within www.quakerfaithandfellowship.org for discussion of matters related to Britain YM.
I can even make two subforums for that purpose: one public, one only accessible for members that are logged in.
Would that suit your purposes (and our purposes as Quaker-B)?
You would be very welcome to be co-administrator of QF&F, as we have been searching for someone to share that role with me for quite a while.
(And we have been searching for more moderators as well, of which we have two now, Tom and Yeshe, in the cc.)
QF&F now pays for webhosting to a firm in California (with financial support from The Hague Monthly Meeting).
If the connection to your server is strong enough and your webspace is for free, we could consider moving.
With f&Friendly greetings,
Wim
From: quak...@googlegroups.com [mailto:quak...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rosalind Mitchell
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2013 11:10 PM
To: quak...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Quaker-B] Is the Quaker Business Method dead?
You may like to have a look at
http://www.42suggestions.co.uk/forum/index.php
as a possible way forward. I've got oodles of web space – far more than I'm likely to need – ready for use by my new enterprise and I might as well put it to good use.
Rosie